Game Writing, Game Reviews and Game Design Thoughts by Steve D

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Adventures at Bezerka Con

I’m not a rich man. I’m not even a not poor man. Which means I ache when I go to conventions: I want to support all the amazing people who create a space of creation and sharing and selling. My grandfather used to go to markets to sell his woodwork and he said one day he’d get his revenge by going to their stalls and walking around with his hands in his pockets – his turn of phrase for perpetual browsers. But what I can do is connect people. My superpower is to be the nexus, to link your needs to the people who can fulfill them. So here’s all the amazing things I saw at BezerkaCon.

And first of all, the first amazing thing was Bezerka Con itself! It was held in beautiful Balmain in a lovely venue, the strange layout of which were instantly fixed by excellent dedication to first class signage. It was the Other Kind of Con – some cons, especially RPG cons are places so devoted to quality RPGing and LARPing that the whole event is about sequestering people away in separate rooms for intense gaming experiences. Those kind of cons are amazing for getting the best quality players to the best quality of games, and SydCon and EyeCon do them very well. The Other Kind of Con comes from a different place, where people can get RPGs at home and come for special events, one-offs and a shared, festival atmosphere in a central hall where swag is plentiful and shopping common (so you can see things you’ve never expected like rings which are dice). Bezerka Con had this approach, hence all my links below, but that doesn’t even cover the robot fighting game or the amazing raffles (yes that’s a pillow in the form of Alastair from Dragon Age) or the paint-and-take fun from the ever-reliable guys at Reaper. I missed the cosplay on Saturday but they are better seen in main halls, as are little costume touches and amazing 1980s board games including this He-Man pop-up masterwork. Can’t wait till next time in July or so.

The dice ring is from CritSuccess.com, by the way, and are amazingly cool, and come in d6s and d100s and many colours. I also saw some precious metal and semi-precious stone dice creations from the amazing people at Level Up Dice – dice so precious they come with a suede-lined box so you can roll them without damaging. That link doesn’t link to their catalogue of merchandise because they prefer to sell in person because who buys jewellery on the internet? It’s more precious than that.

That’s dice made of jewellery, but if you want jewellery made of dice like these amazing pieces, you want HannahGoanna.com – yes, guys it includes cufflinks and belt clips. Hannah ran the con too and her grandmother makes crochet and knitted things in the shape of pretty much anything (note the dragons, unicorns and tiny Cthulhus down the bottom) which is why they call her Clever Bev.

If you prefer the written word to the drawn picture, though, Assaph Mehr was selling his new novel of murder mystery and investigation set in a Roman empire powered by magic: Murder in Absentia, from Egretia publishing.

I’ve definitely missed somebody out, so no offence intended to those lovely people! Keep making magical things and I will keep doing what I can to throw them into the faces of people who need them!